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Product Description

Platform: PC Download | Edition: Standard

From the Manufacturer

Sid Meier's Civilization V is the fifth offering in the multi-award winning Civilization turn-based PC strategy game series. As with earlier installments in the series, Civilization V features the famous "just one more turn" addictive gameplay that has made it one of the greatest game series of all time. In addition to this it also features improved diplomacy, unprecedented modding tools and functionality, new ranged combat over a hex oriented board rather than squares, an in-game community hub facilitating improved online play and more.

A Legendary Franchise Reborn

With over nine million units sold worldwide, and unprecedented critical acclaim from fans and press around the world, Sid Meier's Civilization is recognized as one of the greatest strategy franchises of all-time. Now, Firaxis Games will take this incredibly fun and addictive strategy game to unprecedented heights by adding new ways to play and win; new tools to manage and expand your civilization; extensive modding capabilities; and intensely competitive multiplayer options. Civilization V comes to life in a beautifully detailed, living world that will elevate the gameplay experience to a whole new level making it a must-have for gamers around the globe. In Civilization V, players strive to become Ruler of the World by establishing and leading a civilization from the dawn of man into the space age, waging war, conducting diplomacy, discovering new technologies, going head-to-head with some of history's greatest leaders and building the most powerful empire the world has ever known.

Playable Civilizations

Civilization V features 18 playable civilizations chosen from every corner of the globe and from pivotal points in history. Each of these features a charismatic and historic leader who speaks in his/her native tongue, while their forces possess special abilities and units. The culture of each civilization will evolve, with players unlocking and adopting social policies over time, which bring benefits and improvements appropriate to the stage of civilization achieved to that point. Playable civilizations include:

America

Arabia

Aztec

China

Egypt

England

France

Germany

Greece

India

Iroquois

Japan

Ottoman

Persia

Rome

Russia

Siam

Songhai

Key Game Features

Believable World - More than just a strategy game -- the expanded visuals and immersive audio invite would-be kings to take up the reigns of power and forge a mighty empire. Civilization V offers a limitless variety of vast, realistic and diverse landscapes for players to explore, battle over and claim as their own.

Inviting Presentation - An intuitive interface eases both new players and Civ veterans into the game. Guided by a set of trusted advisors who will explain game functionality and provide counsel for significant decisions, even first-time players will be confident in the choices they make.

Huge Battles - Combat is more exciting and engaging than ever before. Wars between empires feel massive with armies spreading across the landscape. The addition of ranged bombardment allows players to fire weapons from behind the front lines, challenging players to develop clever new strategies to guarantee victory on the battlefield.

Live History - Write your own epic story each time you play. Choose one of eighteen historical civilizations to lead from the stone-age to the space age on your quest to build the world's most powerful empire.

Improved Diplomacy - Negotiate with some of history's most cunning rulers, each with a well-crafted plan for victory. Successful diplomacy will depend on players carefully managing relationships with other leaders, trading items and land, plying them with gold, and deciding if they are friend or foe. City States will present a new diplomatic battleground on which the major powers of the world will vie for supremacy.

In-Game Community Hub - Compete with Civ players from all over the globe via the Internet, offering endless ways to rule the world. The game itself now serves as the hub of community activity, featuring the ability to share scenarios, compare scores, brag about achievements and visit one of the thriving Civ fansites without leaving the game. It's now easier than ever for players to become involved in the global Civ Community.

Modability - With unprecedented modding tools, players will have unlimited options for modifying Civilization V any way they like.

New Hex-Oriented Play Spaces - New play area orientation into hex spaces, rather than traditional squares, offers new challenges in game area exploration and expansion.

"Product only available for US distribution. Quantity limits may apply."

Just to give this review some perspective, I've been playing the various iterations of Civ for a very, very long time. I remember playing the original like it was yesterday. Beavis and Butthead on the TV, Nirvana on the radio, and me on my Packard Bell. I spent hours in my mom's basement, wasting away from rickets while the normal kids were soaking up the sunlight, going out on dates, playing sports, and leading generally normal, productive lives. Civ 1 really messed up my life...but in a completely awesome way.

I mean, I couldn't get enough. Doubly so with Civ 2. The things you could do with that game. It had...personality. I remember little stuff, like the different architectural styles, that gave the game such an immersive quality. I remember how every time I played, the world had its own story, and how things would seem to take on a life of their own. The endless war with the Mongols, my alliance with the Germans, butting heads with Caesar. I learned more about history there than I ever did in school. It was fantastic. I didn't even play to win most of the time. I was a fifteen year-old kid in a sandbox.

I got older, and Civ grew with me. I spend endless hours on 3 and 4, balancing game commitments and my real life. When Civ 5 was announced, I didn't hesitate. I bought it immediately.

In short, it didn't take me long before I realized that this new Civ was nothing like the Civ of old. I've never played Revolutions, but I've heard there is a lot of overlap. I don't know. What I do know is that this game is boring. Really, really boring. Never have I clicked the "next turn" button like I have here. Maybe it's because it takes forever to build anything...so long, in fact, that it's easier just to hoard gold and buy things. Maybe it's because expansion and/or conquest isn't really encouraged. The seemingly massive happiness hit just makes it unreasonable. So I sit there, just watching the world slowly go by.

And how slow it is...the loading screen between turns has become my nemesis. I've turned the "superb" graphics down to their lowest setting, just to speed things up, and to keep things from jumping from one side of the world to the other every time I scroll my mouse. Just to be clear, I have a computer that can run all the latest shooters, yet cannot run a turn-based strategy game aimed at a mass audience.

The AI is dumb and unfinished. If my dog had fingers, he could win on prince at least. I don't consider myself the smartest strategist, but I have never lost a war in Civ 5. Ever. I started on warlord, then prince, then king. Onward and upward I went, until I quickly realized that the AI wasn't getting smarter. It was just cheating. This was acceptable 15 years ago, not now.

Why is Gandhi determined to kill me? After 2000 years of good relations, he wants to kill me. Not a biggie, mind you, because all he does is park archers next to my swordsmen, where I can promptly slaughter them. After I defeat his army (without taking any cities), he offers me all of his resources, all of his gold, and all of his cities (except for his capital, of course). He just gives up. I take him up on his offer, because I am obviously smarter than him. But that means my happiness tanks, my production stops, and my steady income stream is now in the red. Whatever. I still have 3 swordsmen and 2 archers. I can conquer the world with that. Screw culture.

Did I mention the music? Man, it's boring. No more period specific soundtrack, tribal or classical. Just the turn-based equivalent of elevator music. I'm sure the graphics are the bees-knees, but with me playing on the lowest graphics setting, I will never know. City-states, which were made out to be a big deal, are not. They ask for stuff, you give it to them (or not). They give you stuff (or not). That is the extent of the city-state strategy. Boring.

Actually, the city-state thing reminds me of a problem I have that extends beyond the poor quality of this game. Professional reviews. Why did every professional game review outlet give Civ 5 high marks. 9/10. A+. Really? Every review I've seen has been the same. "It has hexes!" "It has city-states!" "One unit per tile!" "Ranged combat!" "Beautiful graphics!" I even saw reviews gushing over how cool the opening sequence was (you know, the one you can't skip).

For one, I am tired of seeing the old man in the hut every time I load up. I find it oddly fishy that no "professional" reviewer has brought up the bugginess; the fact that you need an internet connection; the fact that you need Steam; the fact that the AI stinks; etc, etc, etc. Just hexes and city-states. Either they were told to write a good review by the "powers that be," or they spent a total of 3 hours playing before writing their reviews. Either way, I will never trust a professional review source ever again.

I gave this game 2 stars, because I believe it still has the potential to be good. After a few expansions, some mods, a Rhys and Fall, a Fall From Heaven. Yeah, it could be good. I've played around 60 hours, and still see a spark of genius here. But it will take an awful lot of work. Right now, it's like watching paint dry.Read more ›

As a longtime fan of the series, I unfortunately have to say that Civ5 has been vastly overrated by professional reviewers. That's probably because the game looks great and the real flaws don't start to show up until after a few hours of play.

There are certain things I really like about this game. City states were a great addition and make the game a lot more interesting. Being able to purchase land is awesome and realistic. Easier rushbuying is a lot of fun and doesn't unbalance the game.

The new combat system is pretty goofy (for example, archers are a ranged unit but riflemen are not). It's a bit more fun than the old "stacks of doom," but I see reviewers praising the new combat system as "more streamlined" when it is definitely not. Moving an old stack of doom required 2 clicks (click on SOD, click on destination). Now you need to do the same thing 5-10 times as much to move an army.

The new Civic talent tree offers more customization of specific traits, which is fun to plan around. However you can't swap civics to match a change in strategy in-game (eg. teching up at the beginning of the game and then turning to a warlike theocracy once you realize you're likely to lose the space race). This is disappointing. Overall, when Civ5's civics are compared to Civ4 its a wash.

In-between-turn load times suck. On a normal size map in the modern age, I was sitting and watching the hourglass for an average of 15 seconds in between each turn--even when I wasn't watching animations of enemy moves. I'd blame my computer but it runs pretty much every other game at high settings without a hint of a problem.

Music is poor, particularly the asian themed music which sounds like a bad parody of its genre.

It's hard to believe they wasted time animating leaders and making them talk in their own languages. It doesn't add anything to the game and some of their voices (Queen Elizabeth) actually detract from it by being annoying.

The lack of science/gold/culture sliders takes away a lot of customization potential that was fun to tinker with in previous Civ games. This became painfully apparent when going for a cultural victory. A cultural victory doesn't require the last 25% of the tech tree, but you can't stop researching until you run out of money. And in the meantime, because you're still researching new tech, your puppet states are building more and more new buildings and costing you more money. And when you run out of money you can't do a LOT of things, like rush-build or more importantly buy luxury resources and establish good relations with city states that provide culture. Basically you lose the ability to do the things that make the game fun. This is especially frustrating when it have been so easily solved with the old-school sliders, which were never that difficult to manage in the first place.

Civ5 reminds me of Civ3, in that it attempts to add a couple of new game concepts and surprisingly flops at aspects in which its predecessor excelled. Overall, it's an interesting but ultimately flawed game that doesn't hold a candle to its predecessor and will most likely be remembered as one of the weaker chapters of a great series.Read more ›

I received my copy today and just started my first game a few hours ago. I decided to pause it and write my first review on Amazon to share my initial impressions. Let me start off by stating this Civilization is COMPLETELY different from previous versions of Civilization. While this may be problematic for purists, I'm enjoying the game far more than I thought I would. There's definitely a learning curve, as the gameplay differs quite a bit from its predecessors (The Civilopedia is going to be your new best friend). With previous versions, only some of the basics changed (i.e., changes in basic gameplay dynamics or the inclusions and Exclusions of technologies, units, wonders, etc). With this version, quite a bit has changed, making it very dissimilar to previous versions. Civilization 4 and 5 are VASTLY different games. I'd suggest trying the DEMO FIRST before you buy, as the changes may appeal to some and really push away others.

SOME OF WHAT'S DIFFERENT:

- Like every previous version, the graphics have been overhauled and improved. In my opinion, the graphics are absolutely BEAUTIFUL! (Just a quick note: I'm using an overclocked DirectX 11 capable card, so I'm able to use the High detail options along with DirectX 11 with no problem whatsoever, so keep that in mind if you have a system that doesn't have DX11 or a lower than the minimum specifications graphics card, as that will probably make your experience of the graphics differ from mine.)

- Hexagons instead of squares, which allow for more movement and attack options, necessary due to the change in combat and the removal of stackable units. This really doesn't affect the gameplay much, in my opinion it's a minor change that was necessary for this particular version.

- The inclusion of City-States is fantastic, but do require management to sustain the relationships you've developed with them. They can either be fantastic allies (that share resources or units), or a permanent enemy that wants nothing more than to see you wiped off the face of the planet (there's actually a couple of levels in between but those are the two extremes). In my opinion this adds some much needed variety as I've always felt limited by the set number of civilizations in previous versions. Once you've encountered all the other Civs in previous games (generally early on in the game), and developed strategies on how to deal with them, you can implement your strategies, change them slightly as needed and plan your diplomatic long game. With City-States, however, the discovery of a new one can force you to rethink your strategy as they may have access to a resource you desperately need or even be a problematic roadblock if they dislike you and are permanently at war with you. Their inclusion definitely adds a dimension to the diplomatic game. You can't micromanage the City-States, but if you want their help you have to maintain positive relations with them. This is accomplished mostly by furnishing them with gold and units, or even completing missions given by the City-State (i.e., destroy this barbarian encampment for us, or build a road for us, etc.)

- I was a bit worried about the combat system when I heard Civ 5 didn't allow unit stacking. However, in my opinion, the changes to combat are mostly positive. I like that you can't stack units as it requires more thought on how you're going to attack. If you encounter a city that is strategically placed to block off all access except for one hexagon, you're going to find yourself having to funnel your troops through the choke point, placing you at a major strategic disadvantage. In previous versions you could stack a dozen units and overtake the city despite such a bottleneck. In this version you will be required to push units through, and if one is destroyed, you'll have to use movement points to move the unit behind it into position to attack, this means that city placement and unit placement now have greater importance and require more thought. Archers, also, can't just go barreling into a city and shoot up the place... well, they can, but you can't overtake the city with a ranged unit. Instead they function much more effectively as a backup to melee units, making placement 2 hexagons away to bombard while your melee units attack the garrisoned units a much better strategy. For the most part, I think the change in combat is the best change so far.

- You can now buy land around your city to force expansion instead of waiting for your borders to expand on their own, I rather like this as now I can seize up some of those resources that are just outside of my borders instead of having to wait for my borders to grow.

- They've also included Natural Wonders (like the Great Mesa, and other natural formations) which add bonuses to cities built near them.

- How state policies are handled are also very different. Instead of researching a technology to unlock specific policies, you now have to spend culture points to unlock policies (that have different benefits) on an RPG-like policy tree that is under an overall ideology (which is unlocked by research). Some policies can be implemented at the same time, while others are mutually exclusive. I haven't played enough to know how this will affect the overall game, but so far it's interesting.

- The exclusion of religion is a major problem with this game, in my opinion. Historically, in both real life and in Civilization religion has been a major factor in both forming early alliances and in the starting of wars. In the early game, especially, I can feel the absence of state religions in my diplomatic options. I hope they include it in a future expansion pack.

- The exclusion of some of the civilizations and leaders from previous versions bothers me as I did have some favorites. However, if I'm not mistaken, I think there's some DLC's coming that will add additional civilizations, and we will most likely see additional civilizations in future expansions.

- CORRECTION: As Rob points out in the comments section there are additional map options beyond the Random, Continents Archiepelago and Earth options available in the basic screen. These can be found in the Advanced menu during the Pre-Game setup, thanks Rob! That helps quite a bit :)

(Original Release Day Comment: Limited map choices is also, in my opinion, a mistake. There are only a few options, such as Random, Continents, Archipelago, and Earth. I miss the variety available in previous entries.)

- Now... here's one of the most interesting changes. The addition of an in-game modification browser that downloads and auto-installs any mod you select from the browser. Civilization has always had a thriving mod community, but by integrating the new mod browser, people who wouldn't otherwise know to go to mod sites, now have access to the mods in-game. Some of the mods already available include unlocking the Celtic Civilization as well as additional map types. They do include a warning saying that these modifications are not created by Firaxis and may contain viruses (a necessary disclaimer, of course), so pay close attention to the details and if it gives you a link check the source. Just use caution and care when downloading as you would with anything. In my opinion, though, this is a fantastic change. Yes, mods were available before, but this makes it easier than ever to find, install and use; they are broken down into category if you're looking for a specific type of mod.

- Steam... Controversial I know. I'm not a big fan, myself, but that's just my personal preference. To be honest, while it's not my favorite system in the world, it's not really a deal breaker for me either. However, I think their use of steam is mostly for the benefit of the multiplayer experience (I mean besides the obvious copy protection reasons). However, I never really use multiplayer so I can't really comment on the pros and cons of the multiplayer. Apparently, your saved games are put on the Steam Cloud, I'm not entirely sure what that entails but I'm sure someone will elaborate eventually.

I'm giving this 4 out of 5 stars. I think this version has quite a bit of potential, but I think we'll have to wait for some of the expansions to see that potential fully realized. However, I've also felt that way about previous versions. For example, I didn't feel that Civilization 4 really came into its own until Beyond the Sword was released (just my opinion, of course). Will I stop playing Civilization 4? No. I think both games are different enough that they can stand on their own and provide different gaming experiences. Though, for the most part I'm pretty satisfied with the new version (though, some of the new aspects still feel a bit clunky and aren't as streamlined as they could be, but like I mentioned above that might change in future expansions). It's different and I'm going to have to get used to it, but so far I'm enjoying the game.

Keep in mind, my first game is still going, and I'm still pretty early into the game, but these are my initial impressions and I do hope they help anyone who is curious about what's different with this version. Happy World Domination everyone!--------

UPDATE: 8 hours into the game, encountered my first game-breaking bug during one of the diplomatic screen animations and lost a lot of my progress. You may want to wait for the first set of patches as others have suggested, or remember to save often as the autosave has been a bit buggy for me.

PATCH RELEASE: First Patch to address crash issues released on Sept. 28th. Hopefully that will take care of some of the crashing issues. It came faster than I expected, but we'll have to wait and see if the issues are mostly fixed or not.--------

ANOTHER UPDATE: While it's still fun, I'm starting to find myself questioning whether or not this has the same level of replayability as Civilization 4 for me (at least the Vanilla unmodded version of 5, but then again I guess that's what mods are for, but I do expect the vanilla version to at least hold my interest for a while). I'll know better in a few weeks (after finding the difficulty level and settings that appeal the most to me). Maybe it's getting used to the new interface, but I find my interest lagging a little (though I am still enjoying it, but probably not as much as 4) in a way that it never did with other Civilizations. I would like to drop the fun rating down a star for the time being, but Amazon doesn't seem to be letting me. Again, just a personal opinion, maybe after a few more games I'll have a better idea, but at the moment I'm just not sure I'll play this version as much as I played 4, I guess only time will tell.--------Read more ›